Monday, February 15, 2010

As a gluten free person, eating out can be a boring pain in the ass. If I have to eat another slice of 'orange and almond' I may have to gauge my own eyes out. It's soooo rare to find cafes with gluten free bread, let alone savoury gluten free snacks!

So, I have been brainstorming fillings since my last batch of gluten free savoury thingies. I found some free range organic chicken thighs reduced to clear and thought I would make potato top savouries.

I tried to photograph everything I was going to use, but I'm more of an impulsive 'ooh! I can put this in! Oh and this! And a pinch of that!'

I chopped and then baked the chicken, probably would have been easier if I had baked then chopped...

Mashed potatoes, which I added spinach and brocolli to.

I could have googled how to cut the pastry but was way lazy and experimented instead. I found that two thin strips to make a 'cross' worked best. Some I was even able to close up like you would a cardboard box.

How do you cut your pastry? I would like to get a pie dish, would be healthier to eat less pastry and more filling I suppose.

Me in my vintage apron. I had no idea that I had a problem with shutting cupboard doors until I saw this. I may have to see someone about that. Or perhaps I should see someone about the anger which lies just under the surface of my sausagey disposition, which is totally directed at orange and almond slices. Such anger leads me to wield a BIG knife in preparation for a cafe massacre. Rahhh!! (Haha reminds me of people who say they don't have anger issues and then CRACK IT BIG TIME with road rage or at junk mail. I once did a psyke test and one of the questions was about my feelings towards junk mail, random, no?)

Sadly, SB woke up and I ASSUMED SD was watching the savouries, and SD ASSUMED I had a timer on, so they were a little crunchier than intended, but still ohhh sooo delicious. The mash complimented them perfectly and was a great way to slip in some extra iron and greenage. At least a couple of serves of the days vegies in this, which is something I try to think of when looking at the food intake for the day. Next time I'm going to try gluten free TVP mince.

I really enjoy making these and hope to one day be organised enough to make the pastry from scratch. There is enough to cover leftovers tomorrow and probably a snack as well so not bad. The pastry itself is $10 so all up, it's pretty expensive, I probably shouldn't be making this every week but I'll work on it and it will be nice to be able to rock up at a party with a dish that isn't my faithful gluten free Basco butter cake....

Do you have a dish you always take to parties? What's your favourite recipe?

On the Sausage Housewife FB page, we've decided to each try the same recipe and adapt it for our dietary requirements, and then post the photos. If you have a recipe you'd like to recommend, please email it to sausagemama@gmail.com.....I'm looking forward to expanding my very small repertoire!

I guess by morning I will find out if my chicken curry savouries were cooked properly! (Ahhh that was what was good about being a full vegetarian - not having to worry about food poisoning....)

Sunday, February 14, 2010

We have some uninvited house guests. Some little son of a BITCH/BASTARD moths who live in our pantry. I didn't discriminate against the first couple I saw, thinking they surely wouldn't do any harm. Little did I know they had eaten open a bag of bread crumbs and had several generations all living in the one packet. I think it's fair to assume they were INBREEDING. And I was singlehandedly supporting them and their incestuous choices by supplying them with breadcrumbs which I don't even eat!!

I went to town yesterday and cleaned the whole pantry out, I let the moths I could catch out the window, murdered the rest and drowned all of their babies. The larvae were carefully laid underneath the lips of plastic container lids, under the flaps of unopened cardboard food boxes and in the folds of plastic wrapping on unopened Salada packets (another gluten filled food! I think I just need to stop catering for people with other dietary requirements.

2 pesky bastard moths rocked up again today. I couldn't be assed calling the Residential Tenancies Association and letting them know these dimwits weren't on the lease and were NOT paying rent, so I sprayed them with ORANGE POWER. It's ON like DONKEY KONG, to quote the ever edumacated Stifler.

In other news, I'm on a juicing, cooking and smoothie-ing binge. As the three of us are all a little under the weather, I stocked up on some fruit and vegies and went to town juicing them all. When you realise what real FRESH juice looks like, it really puts you off buying bottles from the store, I tell you what! I even tipped out the remainder of my V8 juice as the stuff I had made looked infinitely better.

SB helped me cut up the oranges, apples, carrots (I kept the skin on because I know it's better for me, but would prefer it without for sure), watermelon, celery, capsicum and baby tomatoes. Sadly, the juicer 'juiced' some orange skins so the juice is a little more rind-flavoured than I would like (SD and SB wouldn't touch it after a whiff) so my plans of flushing out our toxins with my concoctions failed miserably.

Sadly, the photo of the apple juice didn't take before the camera died. In it's natural state, it looks almost like a peppermint thickshake on top - all frothy, and light green - maybe like a diluted Powerade underneath - NOTHING like the brown juice you buy. I decided to use it to fill my tupperware icy pole containers (see previous posts) with that with a few drops of rind-juice, for SB to enjoy when teething or hot.

The small amount of leftover apple juice failed miserably at sweetening up the litre of juice I had so lovingly made!! But I will chug it down every day, regardless.

Unlike the failed tofu smoothie I attempted tonight. If I forced down another drop I probably would have vomited all over myself. I mixed vanilla jalna yoghurt, gf chocolate powder, soy milk (which I'm not used to, it's been a while since I had that, but I've been rejecting dairy lately) and raw tofu, some LSA and SD watched me aghast whilst I bragged about how awesome it was going to be. I skulled a glass in front of him in hopes that I could influence him to try some, but the attempts at dry heaving may have put him off, incidentally. Looking forward to finding a recipe for that, that's for sure!

I've been keeping my V8 bottles to store sugar, salt, rice and fresh juice in (avoiding using plastic where I can, apart from my Tupperware). Here is a photo of the latter...check out how tonights concoction has separated....

It's been a while since I was a hardcore juicer. Today was rich with experience! That's one way to look at it anyway.

Today's biggest lesson learnt: Go slow, and taste as I go. (But maybe not with the tofu smoothie.)

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Although I do need to work on my presenting food style, these gluten free savoury pastries were AWESOME.

The gluten free sheets were 3 for $10 from Bi-Lo and I filled them with Sanitarium Tinned Savoury Lentils and cheese, and a couple of turkey with cheese.

I am so full I think I'm going to have to roll to bed. Awkwardly on my back somehow.

Sorry it's been so long between blogs, SM is my first baby and SH is the one I enjoy but I don't have alot of inspiration for, as I really suck at housewifery. I hope to love my real children more equally!

About Me

Hey there! I'm changing the focus of the blog to reflect my new life as a 31yr old single parent of Mr 7 & Miss 5. I'm advocating all sorts of important things. I work 3 jobs and I'm writing a couple of novels...when I'm not asleep, dating or wasting time online.